When was the last time you played badminton? I bet it’s been a while. It isn’t exactly the yard game that’s en vogue right now.

Well Saturday I had the pleasure of hitting the shuttlecock, or birdie, across the net with some of my younger family members. We weren’t very good at it; there were very few volleys of any length, but we had fun nonetheless.

During the “game” my five-year-old nephew called the game tennis. I told him it wasn’t tennis, but badminton.

“Oh yeah,” he said. “What’s tennis?”

Before I could answer he said, “Oh, I know, it’s that game daddy and I play on the Wii.”

“Or it’s a sport,” I said, probably a bit too incredulously. “It’s a sport you actually go outside to play. It involves a net low to the ground and a racket you use to hit a ball, bouncing it on the pavement.”

He mostly just looked at me with his cute brown eyes, not understanding any underlying sardonic tone. We kept playing our game of badminton and I smiled, happy the hosts of the family birthday party had declared it a “no video game” day. Thank goodness!